The second week of September isn't the best time to form firm opinions on what we've seen so far in college football. It's just early.

The newborn season is still forming and most statistical measures lack a sample size large enough to make many conclusions. After two games, issues could be just coincidence rather than trended.

However, in case they're not, we've got a few positive and a couple negative aspects of Alabama's early-season returns after wins over Florida State and Fresno State.

The not-so good

Third downs

Alabama is converting 26.9 percent of the time. That ranks 118 of the 130 FBS teams in a category it finished last season ranked 34th (43.8 percent). Against a highly-regarded Seminole defense, the Tide was 3-for-16 (18.8 percent) before improving to 4-for-10 on Saturday.

With a strong running game and improved passing game, this would have figured to look a little better.

Left guard Ross Pierschbacher has insight on what needs fixing there.

"Having negative plays on first and second down puts us in a tough spot on third down," he said. "Being in third-and-10 is tough. They are going to have their best pass rusher out there and bring all these different types of looks. It's on the whole offense to do your job. Receivers get open, offensive line to block, quarterback to make the reads. It's on all of us and we need to continue to work on that this week."

Against Florida State, it had one third down with less than five yards to go in the first quarter. It converted that one. The other two successful third downs needed five and three yards, respectively. Alabama's offense in recent years has almost required successful first and second down plays. Falling off schedule has been the drive killer.

On the positive side, Alabama 3-for-3 converting fourth downs so far.

Red zone touchdowns

This isn't a new one.

Alabama was 64th a year ago with six-pointers on 61.4 percent of the trips inside the 20. After two games this season, the Tide is 44.4 percent on red zone touchdowns to rank 111th.

It had three touchdowns in five trips against Fresno State -- an improvement on the 1-for-4 night against Florida State. Saban still wasn't happy with getting stuffed on third-and-goal at the one in the Fresno State win. There was another in the fourth quarter that would've been a touchdown if not for a running back route going in the wrong direction and getting in the way of a sure scoring pass to tight end Irv Smith.

"I think just communication," he said. "A couple of times in Florida State game communication was a problem. One person saying one thing and the other doing the next, something like that. Just executing. Coach Saban has hit on that and that was our emphasis all this week was executing, doing your job."

And like third downs, there is a silver lining here. Alabama is 9-for-9 in scoring opportunities in the red zone thanks to five field goals. Touchdowns over field goals will be the obvious priority when SEC competition stiffens.

Tackles for loss

This was a particular strength last season. Alabama finished fourth with 118 tackles occurring behind the line of scrimmage.

After two games, the Tide has 13.0 to rank 53rd. There a few factors in play here including the rash of injuries at linebacker. Fresno State was also getting the ball away quickly with fewer opportunities for backfield tackles. The Tide had three against the Bulldogs and nine a week earlier beating Florida State.

It's nothing major at this point. Just something to watch considering how important backfield disruption was to the last few Tide defenses.

The positive

Turnovers

Though Nick Saban said he wished Alabama had forced more to this point, it has been pretty solid. The four takeaways are tied for 26th nationally. Saban wants more in the forced fumble category but only nine teams have more than the Tide's three interceptions.

The news is better offensively.

After having giveaway issues a year ago, Alabama has not committed a turnover in the eight quarters this season. The plus-4 turnover margin is fourth-best in the country. That's a stat Saban regularly references as a key deciding factor in wins and losses. So far, his teams haven't done anything to put them in a position for failure there.

Quarterback Jalen Hurts hasn't thrown any truly dangerous passes that were nearly intercepted. And the only official fumble was a low shotgun snap that Hurts quickly scooped and ran early in the Florida State game.

Red zone defense

This strength of the past is carrying over to 2017. Of the four trips inside the 20 for Alabama opponents, only one has resulted in a touchdown. Two ended without points and the other a field goal.

A year ago, teams made only 25 intrusions of the red zone with touchdowns coming on 48 percent of such visits. The four trips in two games is a touch ahead of the 1.67-per-game average of 2016, but the clamping down to avoid touchdowns is a positive sign.

The only end zone trip came on Florida State's first-quarter drive ending in a short fade route thrown on Minkah Fitzpatrick. The Seminoles had only one drive end on Alabama's side of the field after halftime that night. Fitzpatrick's blocked field goal was the only other red zone trip for Florida State.

Running the ball

Alabama's doing it so far. It has 81 runs to 45 passes through two games. Hurts is a considerable part of that equation since his 104.5-yard average ranks 32nd nationally. Lamar Jackson is the only QB from a non-option offense with a better number.

The rest of the carries have been distributed fairly evenly. Damien Harris' 105 yards came on 15 carries. Bo Scarbrough has run it 21 times for 76 yards with Najee Harris running for 75 yards on 16 tries.

The Alabama running attack ranks 27th so far, but it's hard to make much of yardage stat rankings at this point.

Michael Casagrande is an Alabama beat writer for the Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @ByCasagrande.